resale

Etymology

It is formed from English re- (“again”) + sale,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} probably on the model of the older verb resell, recorded from 1574.^[2] Johnson (1755) gave the same derivation.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

The sale of something that had been bought before: 1598, in a translation of Louis Le Roy's French version of Aristotle's Politics.^[2][3] Older dictionaries dated the word later: 1625 in the OED's first edition and in Merriam-Webster's Collegiate,^[8][9] the 1620s in Etymonline^[6] and 1615–25 in Dictionary.com.^[5]

Semantic evolution

The word has kept its first meaning, a sale of goods that have already been bought once.^[2][4] Johnson (1755) defined it as a sale at second hand and quoted Bacon on buying up wares for resale as a way to grow rich.^[7] In the 20th century it became common in trade use: resale price and resale price maintenance, a manufacturer's fixing of the price at which retailers sell its goods, are recorded from 1919,^[8] and the attributive use for second-hand goods from 1960.^[8] Merriam-Webster also records the senses of a sale along a chain of distribution, as from wholesaler to retailer, and of a further sale to the same buyer.^[3] In law it also names the seller's sale to someone else of goods that a first buyer failed to pay for.^[10]

Timeline

• 1574 – the verb resell, to sell again.^[2]
• 1598 – the sale of something previously bought.^[2][3]
• 1919 – resale price and resale price maintenance.^[8]
• 1960 – attributive, second-hand.^[8]

Meanings

Noun

1. The act of selling something again after buying it, especially to the next buyer in a chain of distribution, as from a wholesaler to a retailer: The dealer bought the old cars for resale.^[3][11][4]
2. A sale at second hand: the resale value of a used phone.^[3][9]
3. A further sale to the same buyer.^[3][9]
4. (law) A seller's sale of goods to another buyer after the first buyer has broken the contract.^[10]

Word family

• resalable

Related words

• resell
• sale
• sell

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
8. ^ a b c d e Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
9. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
10. ^ a b Garner, Bryan A., ed. (2004), Black's Law Dictionary, 8th ed., St. Paul, Minn.: Thomson West
11. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins